Playballs illuminated by chemi-luminescent material for play after dark are known in the art. See for example the U.S. Pat. No. 4,015,111 to Spector. The concept of placing the necessary chemical components in a flexible sealed transparent plastic container and maintaining them in unactivated condition until activation is desired, is well understood. See the U.S. Pat. No. 3,576,987 to Voight et. al. In general, it may be stated that playballs illuminated by the light stick of U.S. Pat. No. 3,576,987 or the globular lighting assemblies of U.S. Pat. No. 4,015,111 have not come into any appreciable use because of the difficulty of mounting the lighting means in the ball in a manner permitting easy removal and replacement when exhausted. It has been found however that both the globular lighting assembly of U.S. Pat. No. 4,015,111 and the light stick assembly of U.S. Pat. No. 3,576,987 are capable of providing adequate illumination of all conventional sized translucent walled inflatable playballs such as for example footballs, basketballs, soccer balls, and tennis balls.
Playballs have also been interiorly illuminated by injection of chemi-luminescent liquid directly into the ball by a syringe type needle inserted through a conventional self-closing valve mounted in the wall of the ball. This method although very effective from a lighting standpoint, is however considered by some users as unsatisfactory due to possible contamination of skin and clothing by careless handling of the liquid.